The ancient Egyptian god Set, son of Earth and Sky, was considered a god of many things, including disorder, violence and foreigners, which is a pretty accurate roadmap for Christopher Bollen’s themes in his new psychological thriller Havoc. Set even has a present-day role to play in his incarnation as missing art object.
Bollen’s protagonist is Maggie Burkhardt, an 81-year-old widow from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, who has decamped to a nice, somewhat unfashionable hotel on the Nile in Luxor, Egypt. She’s lost everything – husband, daughter – and we quickly learn that she’s making up for the absences by trying to become a presence in other peoples’ lives, albeit an invisible and unacknowledged one. She recognises when people are unhappy and sets about ‘fixing’ their problems. Adjusting their marriages. In other words, she’s an intrusive, over-the-top busybody.
Her most recent marital interference, at a hotel in Switzerland, went terribly wrong, and we eventually learn exactly how. That accounts for her relocation to Egypt, one of the few countries allowing foreigners during COVID. Truth told, she’s not a very likeable character, and you may find yourself hoping she gets her comeuppance.
Probably you won’t expect that her nemesis will turn out to be an eight-year-old boy. Otto Seeber is cunning, fearless and the orchestrator of much of the havoc that descends on the Royal Karnak Palace Hotel. This fictional hotel was in part inspired by Karnak’s Winter Palace Hotel, where Bollen got his first notion for this story, as well as where Agatha Christie wrote part of Death on the Nile. I’ve been there myself and can attest to the loveliness of the garden and its exotic birds, which becomes a frequent meeting place for Bollen’s characters.
Only Maggie and her archaeologist friend Ben can see past Otto’s mask of childish innocence to the demonic personality underneath. Ben’s husband, Zachary, having a belated stirring of paternal interest in the boy draws him into their circle, and Maggie cannot avoid the kid. Otto has her in his sights and keeps her there.
Maggie sets about trying to arrange situations that will prompt Otto’s mother to return with him to Paris, where her husband, Otto’s father, is working on a film. What will it take to make her decide to leave the hotel, the city or even Egypt altogether? More than Maggie can devise, apparently. Her plots fail predictably and only succeed in drawing her deeper into a cycle of retribution from Otto. Action and reaction. Disorder and violence. It’s a chess game between them, and Otto seems to be coached by Set himself. It’s this core of malevolence that prompts comparisons to Patricia Highsmith’s writing, I expect. If only Maggie could take a step back from the extreme, Highsmithian emotional precipices that let her justify to herself some increasingly dangerous actions.
Having been to many of the places and experienced many of the phenomena Bollen writes about – the Valley of the Kings, the markets, the hawkers – his vivid descriptions seem exactly right. Egypt is a distinctive, romantic place, but it’s also an unfamiliar world. The rules are different there, as foreigners often learn, and the not-quite familiar clearly adds to the suspense. The misalignments between Maggie’s assumptions and the realities of Egyptian life create a frisson of unease. Things can go wrong. When she doesn’t recognise some of the cultural nuances, they do.
Although Maggie is not a particularly sympathetic character, she is very persuasively drawn. I thought I understood her and her flaws, but in the end, Bollen has some revelations in store that may lead you to reevaluate her.
Havoc is an atmospheric and compelling read. It’s a beautifully stage-managed trip to another world, not only in the choice of setting, but in the examination of what goes on inside Maggie’s head.
Also try Bonnar Spring’s Disappeared or Joe Thomas’s Brazilian Psycho.
The Borough Press
Print/Kindle/iBook
£8.99
CFL Rating: 4 Stars
